Bharati got interested
in national politics soon after he came to Madras as a young man of 22 to work as a
sub-editor in “Swadesamitran” daily, the editor of
which was the illustrious G. Subramania Iyer.

G. Subramania Iyer, who was keen on educating his country-men in politics
of self-administration, encouraged his youthful assistant to attend the annual
sessions of the Indian National Congress. Bharati attended the Benares Session in 1905, the Calcutta Session in 1906 and
the historic Surat Session in 1907.

In less than two years,
Bharati had parted company with G. Subramania Iyer.
Subramania Iyer, whose heart was with the Tilak camp
of “Extremists” or the new party, did not, however, wish to break away totally
from the opposing Moderates. Bharati, the young war horse, could not agree.

“India”
Weekly

Leaving “Swadesamitran”, Bharati became the de facto editor
of a brilliant new Tamil weekly called “India.” It was started by some
young men of Triplicane whose central source of
inspiration was M. C. Alasingaperumal, a one-man
public institution, a poor schoolmaster who was the first to take the
initiative to send Swami Vivekananda (then still Swami Sachchitananda)
to America to take part in
the World Parliament of Religions in Chicago.
At the Swami’s behest, Alasingaperumal had started
the two journals, “Brahmavadin” and “Prabuddha Bharata.”

The “India” weekly,
started by S. N. Tirumalachari and his cousins, with
Bharati as its mainspring, created a new era in political awakening in Tamil Nadu.

It was published every
Saturday, in Demy Folio size (that is one-fourth the size of newspapers), 16
pages to the issue, four of which were totally devoted to advertisements. A
large size political cartoon occupied the entire front page. The cartoons
mercilessly attacked and lampooned the British and their supporters in India. Bharati
was the first in all South India to publish
cartoons in any paper, in any language. He was a powerful propagandist for the
national cause, educating people in the fundamentals while swaying them with
current passions.

Surat Congress and after

Bharati met his idol,
the Lokmanya, face to face at Surat. He took
active interest in the deliberations of the new party, particularly when they
discussed future plans and actions. He was the most active worker of the Tilak
school in South India. As the editor of a
highly popular weekly, he was an important participant in the conference of
editors of the new party which met in Surat. It was then decided that in
order to create impact, editors of the party throughout India should
write on a chosen topic each week simultaneously. Bharati was given the job of
co-ordinating the activity in South
India.

Bharati started the Bala
Bharata Sangam to gather together young men round the
party. He also had a paper started, called “Bala Bharata,” for the same purpose.
Branches or affiliated associations were formed everywhere, in Andhradesa particularly. As such he made many new friends
in the Telugu land.

Not much research has
been done about Bharati’s friends and admirers in Andhradesa.
Nor about their relationship. Old diaries, if any, correspondence and
contemporary papers and books might provide us a more intimate picture of the
integrated manner our forbears built up the national cause.

Veeresalingampantulu

Bharati strongly believed in social reform, and
therefore he had great admiration for KandukuriVeeresalingamPantulu
(1848-1919). Veeresalingam was 34 years senior to
Bharati, and he was a close friend and co-worker of Bharati’s first editor, G.
Subramania IyerVeeresalingam
was a great social reformer of the times, and Bharati has brought in both Veeresalingam and G. Subramania Iyer
as real life characters in his social novel (incomplete) titled “ChandrikaiyinKathai” (The Story
of Chandrika).

The nove1 starts with the widowing of Visalakshi, paternal aunt of Chandrika,
left helpless. Visalakshi goes to Madras with the orphaned Chandrika,
to seek the help of G. Subramania Iyer to get her a
husband. Iyer sends her to Veeresalingam
with a letter.

Visalakshi goes to Rajahmundry to be
disappointed. She learns that Veeresalingam has gone
to Madras and
is staying at a house in Egmore. She comes to
Madras and
meets Pantulu, says Bharati:

“... Inside, he was alone, seated in a deck chair and
writing a book.

“Visalakshi saluted him and
gave him the letter from G. Subramania Iyer. Veeresalingam asked her to sit in the chair opposite him.
She sat there with Chandrika in her lap, VeeresalingamPantulu read the
letter in full, and then asked her in Tamil, ‘What day is today?’ She replied
in Telugu, ‘It is Budhavaaramu.’

“Meeku Telugu vachchunaa?’ (Do you know Te1ugu?) Pantulu
asked.

“Avunu, chaalabaagavachchunu’ (Yes, I
know it very well.) said Visahkshi.”

Husband-Wife Team

Bharati then goes on to narrate how Pantulu’s
wife came in while he was querying Visalakshi about
her attainments. All this is portrayed very naturally and the picture is
effective.

When Mrs. Pantulu learns of the
reason for Visalakshi’s visit, she recalls that GopalaIyengar, Deputy Collector
in Tanjore, who had expressed an interest in marrying
a widow, had called, and she thought this girl would suit him. There is a
discussion between husband and wife on the matter. Visalakshi
assures VeeresalingamPantulu
that she is willing to wed GopalaIyengar,
although he drinks, hoping to reform him after marriage.

At this juncture GopalaIyengar himself comes form downstairs. As he is fond of a
good dinner, Pantulu asks his wife and Visalakshi to go down and prepare a sumptuous feast. After
the feast, Pantulu broaches the subject with Iyengar and he readily agrees under the impression that the
servant-maid, who was having the child Chandrika
while Mrs. Pantulu and Visalakshi
were inside the kitchen, was the prospective girl mentioned by Pantulu. Later when he sees Visalakshi,
he says no and insists on his original choice. Despite, difficulties, Pantulu is able to arrange the inter-caste marriage of GopalaIyengar and the Naidu
servant-maid.

As for Visalakshi, requesting Pantulu to arrange a husband for her somewhere else, she goes
to stay with some relatives of hers. After some painful incidents she meets a
youthful Sannyasi. They fall in love mutually. The
young man renounces Sannyasa and marries the widow
according to Brahmo rites, with the blessings of VeeresalingamPantulu.

VeeresalingamPantulu’s appearance in the novel seems to cease at this
stage. I say “seems” because Bharati didn’t live to complete the novel. He was
quite capable of giving unexpected twists and turns and bringing in Veeresalingam once again.

The novel was written by
Bharati soon after Veeresalingam’s death in 1919, and
some three years after G. Subramania Iyer’s demise in
1916. By that time Bharati was famous enough. He probably wanted to place on
record in his own fashion his high regard for the two reformers. It is
worth-knowing if Veeresalingam has expressed any
opinion about Bharati, in his writings, diaries or letters.

Bharati’s pen-pictures
of Veeresalingam and his wife and the other real
personalities are solid; his discussions of the problems attendant on social
reform are realistic.

Such links as this
between Andhra and Tamil Nadu are well worth wider
publicity, study and research.

SurendranathArya

A second Andhra friend
of Bharati was SurendranathArya,
enfante terrible of Madras oratory in the Swadeshi
days.

Arya had a colourful life. Born a Balija, he
was named Yatiraj Naidu. Travelling in the Punjab, he was so impressed by the good work done there
by the AryaSamaj, that he
joined the Samaj and called himself YatirajArya. He was a short man;
thickset. Very bold. He wore a dress which looked like a military uniform–baggy
pant, coat and turban of the Punjabi type, with tail and tall frill on top
front. This compensated for his shortness. His manner of talking was crisp and
bold, straight-forward and manly. Addressing a public meeting in Madras, he once said
sarcastically, “Do you call yourselves men? Because you have moustaches? Why,
even the harmless eel fish has whiskers.”

At a later time Arya toured Bengal, and he
was so impressed by the BrahmoSamaj
there, that he added the name of the BrahmoSamaj leader SurendranathBanerjee to his own name, and called himself YatirajSurendranathArya.

In 1908 March, when the
whole of India celebrated Swaraj Day, Bharati was in charge in Madras, and Arya
was his lieutenant in all arrangements. He went to jail for one of his speeches
sharply criticising Government for meting out harsh
punishments to V. O. Chidambaram Pillai and
Subramania Sivam, who had tried to celebrate Swaraj Day in Tirunelveli and Tuticorin.

In prison, he had a hard
time. He was teased and tormented, and tried to commit suicide by hanging
himself. He was further punished for this and had a worse time. Just then he
was befriended by some Christian missionaries and after release he was sent to
the United States
for theological study. He had become a Christian. After Christian theological
study in America, he
returned to India
with an American Swedish wife in whose honour he
added the word Voegeli to his name which now became YatirajSurendranathVoegeliArya.

On return, he became a
missionary of the DanishMissionChurch
and lived with his Swedish American wife in a huge bungalow in Purasawalkam. At the time of Bharati’s death in 1921, he
was one of those who spoke at the cremation ground. Arya
spoke in Telugu.

In later years, Arya separated from his Swedish American wife, became a
Hindu once again, joining the BrahmoSamaj. For sometime he was a supporter of the Justice Party
and later even supported the Self-respect Movement of E. V. Ramaswami (Periar). He passed away in the early ‘Thirties.

On his return from the
States, Arya went to Pondicherry to meet his old friend Bharati.
Bharati and himself spent a whole day together happily. Bharati, however, was
quite distressed to hear that Arya had left the Hindu
fold to become a Christian.

G. Harisarvottama Rao

One of Bharati’s dearest
friends was G. Harisarvottama Rao. I wish I had
enough details about his life. All that I have been able to collect about him
is that he was a student martyr of the Swadeshi
Movement. Details about this are available in the pages of Bharati’s “India”
weekly of 1907.

In May 1907, Bepin Chandra Pal, the Swadeshi
leader, came on a visit to Madras,
where he addressed a series of meetings. This visit of Bepin
Pal to Madras was a turning point in the
political life of South India. From that date,
South India became a stronghold of Tilak and Swadeshi.

The Madras
visit of Pal was arranged by the Bala Bharata Sangam
founded by Bharati and other young men in Madras.
Bharati went all the way to Bezwada (now Vijayawada) to escort Bepin Pal to the city. His “India”
Tamil weekly reported Bepin Pal’s triumphant lecture
tour, giving details of meetings all the way from Calcutta. Bepin Pal
spoke at Cuttack,
Vizianagaram, Visakhapatnam, Cocanada,
Rajahmundry and Bezwada
before he arrived in Madras.

The main result of Bepin Pal’s visit to Cocanada and
Rajahmundry was
that the student population in the two towns became virulently Swadeshi. They started wearing badges with the word “VandeMataram” inscribed, a word
that wasanathema to the ruling white men.

In Cocanada,
a student who shouted VandeMatararam
within the hearing of District Surgeon Major Kemp was harshly beaten by the
Major. The boy swooned. When he recovered he was taken to the police station
and kept under custody, medical aid being denied under orders of the surgeon!
At ten o’clock in the night people interested in the boy gathered together and
marched to the local English Club which they attacked. A church and a number of
European houses were also attacked. The District Magistrate was rebuffed when
he came with a posse of policemen. Sixty Reserve policemen from Rajahmundry then arrived
to initiate a reign of terror. Several arrests were made.

Rusticated and Barred

While Cocanada was aflame like this, in Rajahmundry,
the students, led by G. Harisarvottama Rao, a
graduate who was undergoing teacher training in RajahmundryTrainingCollege, started wearing
badges with the word “VandeMataram”
inscribed on them. As a result Harisarvottama Rao and
other student leaders were rusticated from the college by Principal Mark
Hunter. Angered by this action, 171 students voluntarily left the institution.

The Madras Government,
appraised of the situation, came out on the side of the Principal and added
their own punishment for Harisarvottama Rao and
another student leader. Harisarvottama Rao was
permanently barred from appearing for the M. A. degree or teacher training. Ramachandra Rao, the other leader, was barred from
appearing for the B. A. degree for which he was studying. Two other students
were barred from study for two years. All the other students who stayed away
from college were barred from joining any other college anywhere.

Giving these details,
Bharati said in his “India”
(July 22, 1907) that such harsh punishment by Government should only
strengthen the resolve of the people of Rajahmundry
to establish a “SwadeshiCollege”
which would not care for Government recognition.

G. Harisarvottama Rao had
been Bharati’s co-worker even before Bepin Pal came
to Rajahmundry.
This is also learnt from news published in Bharati’s “India.” According to the paper,
when Bharati and friends started a Bala Bharata Sangam
(and a monthly in English “Bala Bharata” later on),
the Bala Bharata Samiti was established in
Rajahmundry by Harisarvottama Rao. As early as
February 1907, the Samiti took out a Swadeshi procession with banners proclaiming “VandeMataram” and “Allaho-Akbar.” The 80-strong processionists
went to KotilingaKshetra,
and Harisarvottama Rao and another student leader, Veerabhadra Rao, addressed a 10,000 strong public meeting
on Swadeshi, boycott of foreign goods, etc. Printed
leaflets were also distributed.

I have a vague memory
that Harisarvottama Rao started a paper called “Swaraj” in 1908 which was highly critical of the Government
and was suppressed therefor. Harisarvottama
Rao remained a close friend of Bharati till the poet passed away!

When Bharati poems were banned

In 1927 and 1928 when
Bharati’s national songs were prohibited or proscribed, several Telugu admirers
of Bharati participated discussions in public bodies like the Corporation of
Madras and old Madras Legislative Council expressing their support to Bharati.

In 1927, GaddeRangiah Naidu, in the
Madras Corporation, staunchly supported a move to teach Bharati’s song “VandeMataram” to all students of
corporation schools.

In 1928, following a ban
order by the provincial Government of Burma, the provincial Government in Madras proscribed
Bharati’s books “SwadesaGeethangal”
Parts I and II. The Madras
order came, with a vengeance, on Bharati Day, September 11, 1928. In the
Legislative Council, S. Satyamurti brought an
adjournment motion on the seizure of copies of the banned books. It was a
historic debate, when the poems from the banned volumes were sung in the House,
by Satyamurti and a number of other speakers much to
the chagrin of Government. Ultimately the Government lost the vote on the
adjournment motion.

Among those who
supported Satyamurti’s adjournment motion was G. Harisarvottama Rao, who was then a Member of the
Legislative Council.

Most Enchanting Songs

“Mr. President, Sir”,
said Harisarvottama Rao, “this is one of the matters
which shows the soulless nature of the Government machinery. The order is made
by the Burma Government; this Government reproduces the order in the Fort
St. George Gazette and the police forthwith ask for a warrant. The
magistrate issues the warrant and the books are seized. Not a moment’s
consideration is given to the matter by anybody responsible for the
administration of this department of work, either the Hon. Law Member or the
Home Member. They must have had time enough before this motion came up for
discussion here to see that justice was done to these involved. These songs
have been in existence for thirty years and they have been sung all over the
country. I am acquainted with some of these songs and being an Andhra I cannot
claim an erudite knowledge of them. As one who has had something to do with
Tamil while I was in the city of Madras,
I feel bound to say that the most enchanting songs I have heard are found in
these volumes.”

Continuing, Harisarvottama Rao said, “There is nothing that a
Government can do which will offend the self-respect of a nation more than
proscribing its literature. This is literature of the first-rate and it has
been claimed to be the literature of the highest order and has been introduced
in schools and colleges. Under the circumstances, the authorities should have
deeply considered the matter before they took such action. The whole of the
Bengal Partition agitation and the VandeMataram agitation arose out of the fact that an order
regarding the vernacular of Bengal had
offended the population. Similarly, I am certain that if the Government go on
at this rate and confiscate Bharati’s songs, the whole of Tamil land must be in
revolt. Government will have to thank themselves if the whole of Tamil Nadu to a man stands up and says, ‘Here are the songs which
have been proscribed and we shall sing them; we shall insist upon singing them;
we shall see what the Government does.’ I shall not be surprised if such a
movement should be set on foot if this motion should get defeated in this House
by the efforts of the Hon, Law Member in charge of police. I am certain that
the members of the House are alive to their responsibilities and that this
motion will not be lost ... To proscribe poetry of the highest order which has
been in existence for so many years is worse than sedition itself. It is
sedition against the whole spirit of the nation, against the very soul of the
nation...I hope, Sir, that this motion will bring the Government to its senses
and that we shall have a speedy remedy in this matter and that the nation will
be spared the great humiliation of witnessing one of its brightest jewels being
attempted to be sent to oblivion by a bureaucratic Government.”

The ban on Bharati’s
national songs created all-India stir when Gandhiji took up the issue and wrote
an editorial note in his weekly “Young India” condemning the ban order as
“Justice Run Mad.” At the same time, “Young India” started publishing
translations of some ten poems by Bharati, rendered into English by Rajaji.

The Madras Government
not only ordered return of all confiscated copies, but also persuaded the
Government of Burma, the original sinners, to cancel their ban order.

C. R. Reddi’s Tribute

In 1937, when the
English works of Bharati were edited and brought forth in two volumes (“Agni and Other Poems and Translations” and “Essays and
Other Prose Fragments”), C. R. Reddi, who was then
Vice-Chancellor of the Andhra University, gave a foreword to the Volumes, in
collaboration with K. S. Venkataramani.

The six-para foreword is worth-quoting in full. It read:

“For the last one
hundred years the Tamil genius has not expressed itself at its real best in any
department of life, much less on the creative side, in song and literature. The
reasons are many, both political and sociological. This is worth-exploring, if
only to liberate the stream of creative fancy from the sands of a decorous but
false tradition in education and approach to life. Creative artists like B. R. Rajamier and Subramania Bharati are like oases in the
desert–as if the endless waste of sand gets wearied of itself and produces a
spot of green for the sheer joy of creation.

“The Tamil genius
rejoices in scholarship, in clearness and purity and in the incisive analysis
of its own precious accumulations. Where it is creative it becomes
metaphysical, laden with a rapture whose significance and pleasure are only to
the chosen few who have transcended the mind-consciousness. Our songs even in
their lost lyrical moments have always the mystic touch. The quest after the
Eternal gives our melodies a stellar gleam.

“Subramania Bharati’s
poetical genius is the happy result of a cross fertilisation,
the clash and contact between two great cultures. They say the oyster breeds
the pearl in a moment of irritation. Subramania Bharati poured forth his
patriotic songs in a like moment of conflict, suffering and struggle, when his
sensitive and vigorous nature keenly felt the slavery of his country and man’s
inhumanity to man. His warm emotional temperament and aesthetic nature quickly
responded in song to the immense joys of freedom and sunshine, like a lotus bud
to the stimulating rays of the dawn.

Shakespearean Touch

“Subramania Bharati’s
songs in Tamil have almost a Shakespearean touch in the freshness, spontaneity
and suggestive power of the lyrical outbursts. They herald a new epoch in our
lives. Bharati is not a summer cloud, but the first expression and descent of
the monsoon itself, scattering its pearls of plenty over land and river, over
hill and dale.

“The authentic Bharati
quality, racy and indigenous, persists even in this collection of poems and
essays in a foreign language to which we are given the privilege of writing a
foreword. When a poetic soul like Bharati’s, happy beyond dream in his own
mother-tongue, turns to an alien language for the aching joy of
self-expression, it is no surprise to find that the art becomes laden with a
more serious thought. For the highest aim of self-expression even in art is
after all self-realisation. This intense longing for the Divine is visible in
every song and every page of this collection. We shall not analyse
the qualities of each. Analysis is a kill-joy though the Tamil mind rejoices in
it.

“We offer this precious
book to the reader with the same ecstasy with which a guide greets a caravan
marching on desert sand and offers to his friends the pure spring water in the
oases.”

TwoTranslators

Although Tamil and
Telugu are next door to one another, mutual translations of literary works are
negligible in number. Greater mutual translations would help promote greater
understanding and integration.

However, during
Bharati’s time, there seem to have been a better climate of such translations.
Two Telugu friends are reported to have translated some of Bharati’s national
songs into Telugu. It must have been only on a limited scale, since no book
seems to have come out as a result of their efforts.

The first person to
translate Bharati into Telugu is said to be DuggiralaGopalakrishnayya. I have heard this stated by
reliable persons. But have not been able to trace the translations. We must try
and trace them.

The other translator of
Bharati into Telugu was one K. ParthasarathyIyengar of Nellore, who sent me some samples
of his translations in the ‘Fifties. He had perhaps translated about a dozen
poems, but had not been able to bring them out in print.

Of coure,
the Sahitya Akademi has done a translation of
selections from Bharati. This book must be out of print now, as it came
twenty-five years ago. Whether the Akademi has any
plans to bring a fresh edition of this old book or issue a fresh book to mark
Bharati’s Centenary, I have no knowledge.

All in all, Bharati had
many Telugu friends, some of whom I have mentioned, and he was as much at home
with them as with his Tamil compatriots. For him, no barriers existed; he was a
universal spirit at home everywhere and with everyone, and was likewise
welcomed everywhere.